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Police warn pedophile plans to move to London

It seems like an easy call — a convicted pedophile, whose many victims included toddlers and who’s a high risk to re-offend — is moving your way.

To protect kids, police make the call — as they did Wednesday in London — to publicly out the offender.

But what if that warning only drives people like Robert Albert Bell — a 15-time child sex offender, fresh out of prison and London-bound — underground?

“It is a balance,” said Fred Berlin, head of the sexual disorders clinic at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.

“If people are alerted enough not to allow this person to become part of their lives and the lives of their children, the (public notification) could serve a useful purpose,” he said.

“But I have seen where it drives people out of one community, which may lose the problem but doesn’t resolve it.

“If it drives people underground, that may be counterproductive.”

Police are well aware of that risk and seriously considered it before deciding to publicly identify Bell, said the head of London police investigations branch.

“We recognize that it could drive him underground and it is a risk if he goes to hiding,” said Det. Insp. Kevin Heslop.

“We do consider that, but we have to weigh it out with, ‘do we think the community is safe by not making a release?’” he said.

“If we have a reasonable belief that they are not safe, we have an obligation to warn them.”

Wednesday’s rare public warning didn’t include an address for Bell, but did include his typical method of operation: That’s included him befriending parents of young children, then betraying that trust by sexually assaulting those kids.

At 300 lbs and confined to a wheelchair, the 57-year-old man seems an unlikely danger. But he’s left victims across Canada, all between ages 2 and 12 when he assaulted them. That history of indecent assaults on young children, sexual assaults and invitation to sexual touching, spans three decades, reoccurring after every prison release.

And his behaviour has “escalated,” say police.

Heslop said police had to consider the level of threat posed by the offender and police ability to monitor them.

“With this offender, when he is out of our sight, we have concerns.”

Bell had planned to move to Peterborough after his recent release from a 14-year prison sentence, but changed his mind after Peterborough police sought strict conditions on his release.

In London, he’s still bound by those rules, Heslop said.

“If he breaches any of the conditions, we will be relentless in getting him back into custody,” he vowed.

Among those conditions, Bell can’t own any camera or access the Internet for anything but schoolwork and must stay away from children unless accompanied by an adult who’s aware of his criminal past.

Bell’s crimes against children date back to 1979, when he admitted to molesting an 8-year-old girl.

In 1981, he was convicted of molesting three children, between ages 2 and 8, after befriending the toddler’s parents.

Then. in 1983 he was convicted of two counts of indecent assault on young girls in a Saskatchewan-based Christian organization whose members were trying to help Bell rejoin the community. He served two years and six months in jail.

In 1986 he was convicted again of molesting two boys and a girl. He served 10 years in prison before moving to Thunder Bay, where he befriended a single mother two — violating both kids when asked to babysit. He was sentenced to 14 years. But in 2008, Corrections Canada placed him on statutory release and he moved to Hamilton. He was free, until authorities found him with pictures of kids on his cell phone, and on a computer storage device he wore more pictures — of a woman holding a child, a teenaged girl and what appeared to be an infant being sexually abused.

In court in Peterborough, Bell vowed he’s a changed man.

“I see it as an opportunity to help myself in reintegrating with society,” he said. “I will be a success story this time, as I have not been in the past.”